Field's £24,000 'motherhood endowment'

A £24,000 'motherhood endowment' has been proposed to encourage young mothers to stay at home and care for their children. Former Welfare Minister Frank Field said the cash could be paid over the crucial first two years of a child's life.

He said the endowment was the equivalent of one quarter of the money the taxpayer currently pays out in child benefit and child tax allowance over the first 16 years of a child's life.

By concentrating it into the early years of childhood, it would help create families in which children learned the importance of 'proper behaviour'.

In a lecture in Liverpool, Field warned that society puts a 'low value' on motherhood at its peril. He said the Government's policy of 'driving mothers with young children out to work is one reason for the rise of yobbish behaviour'.

In a sustained attack on Labour's obsession with getting mothers into the workplace, the former minister said: 'The Government sees work as the antidote to many of the social problems inflicted upon us.

'It does so without ever giving a hint that when and how we work might be a cause of some of the problems themselves. But does a strategy of work, work and work again necessarily further the best interests of very young children?'

Field said that most mothers with young children 'have to work irrespective of what their emotions and instincts tell them'. He said a recent study highlighted the fact that 'most children are best nurtured by one of their parents in the first two years of their lives'.In most cases, he said, that role is best filled by the mother.

In proposing a substantial endowment to encourage this, Field said it would have to be paid 'at a level equal to what most mothers can gain at work.' In contrast, he said, the Government was focusing on additional childcare provision with the costs falling largely on employers.

He argued that the new endowment should not stand alone. It should be buttressed by 'greater efforts to transmit between generations the skills of good parenting, and likewise teach more generally guidelines which affirm those verities which good families still continue to impart to their young, but which are no longer universally adhered to'.

Field challenged current thinking on child-rearing, insisting that children need the active support of two parents and - where possible - grandparents. 'Even though this is not the norm for many families, what is best for children should not be denied for fear of offending political correctness.'

In addition he called for good parenthood to be taught effectively as part of the National Curriculum. And he demanded a tougher regime for welfare payments with the creation of 'welfare contracts'.

'Each time welfare is claimed the two sides of the contract are spelt out - Here is what society wants to do for you. This is the kind of behaviour we expect in return. In this way welfare also becomes a teaching agent.'

Field, MP for Birkenhead, was made Minister for Welfare Reform after Labour swept to power in 1997, but was was sacked from the Cabinet the following year after reportedly clashing with colleagues including Gordon Brown.

He has been a thorn in the side of Labour's welfare agenda with his back-bench support for gearing the benefit system towards self-help.

Since leaving the cabinet he has led parliamentary campaigns against several of his party's own policies. In 2002 he drafted a private member's bill to allow councils to evict nuisance neighbours and place their children in care.